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Kim Fupz Aakeson to receive an Honorary Award at Copenhagen International Film Festival

When Copenhagen International Film Festival rolls out the red carpet for the Gala Awards Ceremony on Saturday, 29 September, the Danish screenwriter Kim Fupz Aakeson will be presented with an Honorary Award.

Extract from the motivation speech
When a new film is released, the attention usually focuses on the director and the actors. On the actors, because they are so visible, after all that's their profession; and on the director, because he or she is traditionally seen as the guiding force behind the film. The screenwriter, on the other hand, normally enjoys only a modest level of attention. What's more, the screenwriter has the ungrateful task of spending great time and effort on writing something that is hardly read by anyone. (...)

In the past, between the 1930s and the 1960s, there were six authors, who wrote over half the screenplays for all Danish films. They were people who knew how this was to be done. Today, one has the feeling that screenplays are written only by two people. Even if this is a gross exaggeration, it still feels like that when Kim Fupz Aakeson writes the screenplays for 17 films in nine years. (...)

His screenwriting career got going for good in 1999 with The One and Only. With its light-hearted wit and romance, the film marks something of an exception in Fupz's output, but it nonetheless deals with a topic typical for his other screenplays: the crises of relationship and family life. Films such as Minor Mishaps, Okay, Aftermath, Accused and Prague have confirmed Fupz as a true virtuoso of family disasters, a master of marital breakdown and a specialist in crisis-ridden private spheres. (...)

Fupz is a hero of small budgets, as he can create infinitely great things out of infinitely small means. Two people in a room is enough. The films are not costume dramas with a high production value; they are about naked souls being given a thorough psychological X-ray. They are about the minor mishaps and crimes against ones nearest and dearest, about pure hearts and deeply troubled consciences. As a prolific author of books, Fupz could possibly do without films. But Danish films could in no way do without Fupz. He writes stories that directors can tell. And he creates characters that an entire generation of actors can bring to life with feelings, actions and something to say.


Kim Fupz Aakeson
Since the early 1980s, he has worked as a freelance illustrator for newspapers, periodicals and magazines, among others Press, Information and most recently Weekendavisen. Kim Fupz Aakeson is also the author of a number of comics, children's books, short stories and novels. He had his debut as a comic illustrator with Go for It in 1982, and as an author with the children's book Hvem Vover At Vække Guderne in 1984. In 1996, he graduated as a screenwriter from the Danish Film School and has since written screenplays for a whole host shorts and feature films. He had his debut as a feature film screenwriter in 1997 with Michael Wikke and Sten Rasmussen's family film Hannibal and Jerry, based on his own children's book. In 1999 he wrote the romantic comedy The One and Only, which not only went on to be one of the most seen Danish films ever, but also saw the breakthrough of the director Susanne Bier and the actress Sidse Babett Knudsen. It also ea rned Kim Fupz Aakeson a Robert for best screenplay. He has also written the screenplays for Minor Mishaps (2002), Okay (2002), In Your Hands and Aftermath (2004). Together with his colleagues Anders Thomas Jensen and Mogens Rukow, Aakeson was given an honorary Bodil for his contribution to Danish film. He has also worked as a dramatist, among other things writing radio drama for Danish national radio and plays for Ålborg Teater. Fupz is a member of Danish Writers of Fiction and Poetry and the Danish Playwrights' and Screenwriters' Guild.